Pranab Mukherjee honoures 40 legends of Indian cinema

Chennai: President Pranab Mukherjee was the chief guest at the final day of the celebration of centenary year of Indian cinema in Chennai.

In his valedictory address at the centenary celebrations, co-hosted by the Tamil Nadu Government and the South Indian Film Chamber of Commerce, the President said that while he would not advocate a dilution of cinema’s mandate to mirror reality, filmmakers should also use the medium to convey the “right type of message in the right manner.”

The auditorium at Jawaharlal Nehru Indoor Stadium was packed to the rafters with an audience of more than 5,000 as India’s biggest stars made their way into the venue.

Sridevi walked in first to thunderous applause and was followed by Bachchan and then Rekha. But the crowd reserved the loudest cheers for Kamal Hassan, Ajith and Vijay, and went berserk when superstar Rajnikanth made a quick entry. Mukherjee honoured with medals 40 legends of Indian cinema, including Tamil Nadu chief minister J Jayalalithaa, Amitabh Bachchan, Sridevi, Vyjayanthimala Bali, K Balachander, Adoor Gopalakrishnan, M S Viswanathan, Rekha, Javed Akhtar, Madhu, Mammootty and Mohanlal.

Awards and medallions were also presented to stalwarts from Hindi, Gujarati, Bengali, Telugu, Kannada, Punjabi, Malayalam, Marathi and Oriya film industries.